posted at 6:50 pm on December 27, 2011 by Allahpundit

After the first two or three names at the top of these lists, it’s a steep drop percentage-wise. Many make the top 10 without a lot of support…

Only a vote or two kept pious powerhouse Tim Tebow, the Denver Broncos quarterback known for prayer and last-quarter saves, out of the top 10. He still topped the Dalai Lama.

The Tibetan monk was first with Mark Goodman. Goodman, 39, a high school principal in St. David, Ariz., called the Dalai Lama “thoughtful, compassionate and always focused on standing up for his people. That’s real leadership.”

Here’s the full list. The male and female winners are just who you’d expect they are, although Palin has slipped a bit this year while Bachmann has gained enough to crack the top 10. Meanwhile, on the men’s side, the list goes like this:

Breaking on Hot Air

Blowback

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Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s campaign said on Tuesday that it is filing a lawsuit to get on the ballot in the Virginia primary election after state officials announced last week that he failed to turn in the requisite 10,000 signatures.

“Virginia ballot access rules are among the most onerous and are particularly problematic in a multicandidate election,” said Perry campaign Communications Director Ray Sullivan in a statement. “We believe that the Virginia provisions unconstitutionally restrict the rights of candidates and voters by severely restricting access to the ballot, and we hope to have those provisions overturned or modified to provide greater ballot access to Virginia voters and the candidates seeking to earn their support.”
(More….)
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Let’s face it, absent a serious write-in challenge from some other candidate, Virginia won’t be nearly as ‘fought over’ as it should be in the midst of such a wide open nomination contest. Our own laws have reduced our relevance. Sad

Exactly. The rules were changed only in November to an increase of 50% of sigs, favoring only those candidates who have run for POTUS before and hurting grassroots candidates. I hope Allahpundit gives us a thread for this soon…

Exactly. The rules were changed only in November to an increase of 50% of sigs, favoring only those candidates who have run for POTUS before and hurting grassroots candidates. I hope Allahpundit gives us a thread for this soon…

Based upon several reliable reports at RedState, it would appear that Virginia’s GOP establishment changed the rules of ballot access just last month. Front-runner Newt Gingrich, for one, saw his campaign hurt badly by reports that it bungled the Virginia ballot process which saw he and Rick Perry excluded despite each turning in over 10,000 signatures. But if the new reports are true, the state GOP has a hell of a lot to account for.

Moe Lane provides the introduction:

…the very short version is that the VA GOP only certified Mitt Romney and Ron Paul for its primary ballot. Rick Perry and Newt Gingrich both had too many signatures tossed; Jon Huntsman, Rick Santorum, and Michele Bachmann didn’t even try. Of the seven candidates, one (Romney) had more than enough signatures (15K) to bypass the verification process entirely. All of this has caused a lot of agitation among Republicans following the primary process, of course; and not just from people who disapprove of what the VA GOP has done…

…There has been a good deal of defending of the outcome; and one argument heavily used in this defense has been that the campaigns all knew the rules and that previous Republican campaigns were able to get on the ballot, so clearly a competent current Republican campaign should have done so.

One small problem with that: as Winger argues, the rules were allegedly drastically changed. In November of this year.

So what changed?

…prior to the 2012 elections it was Republican party policy in Virginia to simply deem any candidate that brought in ten thousand raw signatures as having met the primary ballot requirements under Virginian state election law.

Under these rules, of course, both Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry would have qualified easily.

And why did the rules change?

…On October 24th independent state delegate candidate Michael Osborne filed suit against the Republican party of Virginia [challenging the signature review process and who performs it] … according to Winger the VA GOP decided in response to bump up from 10K to 15K the threshold for simply deeming the requirements as being met.

…I think that John Fund’s general comment is correct: this is going to go to the courts. John was not discussing this specific wrinkle, but his larger point that Virginia’s ballot access policies have systemic problems gets a big boost when it turns out that the state party can effectively increase by fifty percent the practical threshold for ballot access – in a day, and in the middle of an existing campaign.

…If it is true that the Republican party of Virginia decided in November of 2011 to increase the threshold for automatic certification from 10K to 15K, then it is reasonable to suggest that this was a change that unfairly rewarded candidates who had previously run for President in Virginia.

Lane asserts that the state GOP has ultimate control of the ballot and could, if pressed, decide to certify Gingrich and Perry.

Either way, the issue is going to the courts.

And, either way, the Virginia GOP looks incompetent… or ill-intentioned against conservative candidates.

Action Alert: I urge you to contact the Virginia GOP and demand that they include Gingrich and Perry on the ballot. Be polite, but firm. There’s no excuse for issuing new rules at the last minute that just happen to exclude the leading candidates. In fact, it’s an outrage.

canopfor on December 27, 2011 at 7:42 PM
At first I thought your were giving me a zero! It’s a smiley face… um, right?! ;)

Aslans Girl on December 27, 2011 at 7:52 PM

Aslans Girl:Yes ma’am,happy face:)

canopfor on December 27, 2011 at 8:36 PM

Here are my happy faces to add to yours

:) :) :) :) :)

louisianapatriette is deliriously happy over Cuccinelli’s statement and Perry’s lawsuit. Cuccinelli is a fighter and even if Perry loses the lawsuit (and he very well may win it) he gets LOTS of attention over it. It’s already getting some attention over at Fox:

I would like to see the actual Perry complaint. On what grounds is he suing? My quick take as a Perry advisor would be to argue that by having the GOP primary governed by state law, instead of by the VA GOP party rules, the Equal Protection clause may have been violated by not checking Romney and Paul’s signatures with the same standard as Perry’s and Gingrich’s were.

Perry would have a much weaker case were they to have canvassed Romney’s and Paul’s petitions, instead of just checking off the 15K-signature box.

The problem with checking out a batch of 14,999 signatures more carefully than a batch of 15,000, is that the individual weight of each potential vote in the primary is treated differently in the two batches, with the result of voters in the 14,999 batch being denied the right to vote for their candidate.

The law that allows a batch of 15,000 signatures to pass unverified, is in direct opposition to the law that requires 10,000 valid signatures. The first law obstructs the second law. The two laws are in conflict.

louisianapatriette is deliriously happy over Cuccinelli’s statement and Perry’s lawsuit. Cuccinelli is a fighter and even if Perry loses the lawsuit (and he very well may win it) he gets LOTS of attention over it. It’s already getting some attention over at Fox:

Tebow has some decent qualities, and will likely some day be a very good QB, but he really has not yet earned a place on that kind of list. As a football player he’s not much beyond rookie. His arm is getting better – after the last few games (if you ignore the interceptions) I’d say his arm may now be a little bit better than the Dalai Lama’s.

And although I haven’t cared for SNL for a couple decades, I thought the Tebow skit was funny. I really don’t believe the people joking about Tebow, or Tebowing for cameras are attacking or insulting Christianity – they’re either copying Tebow in admiration or having a little fun at his expense because he’s so vocal and a bit over the top about his religion and he’s big news right now. I used to think one big difference between Christians and Muslims was that most/many Christians had a sense of humor and could take a joke, unlike Muslims – but I’m not so sure lately.

You went off in a different direction than my original comment. I also think Maher is a hateful arrogant moron – but I don’t see the SNL skit in the same category as the crap Maher puts out. I thought the SNL skit was closer to Dan St Paul’s “Worlds First Baseball Game” – which I also think is hilarious – and you have to know something about the Bible for it to be funny. Are you insulted by Catholic priest jokes? I just think it all has a lot to do with what is really said or done and how its presented. I just think some people need to stop interpreting EVERY joke as an attack on Christianity. So far it has only been Muslims who actually kill people over jokes and cartoons. Some Christians seem to be heading down the same path of over-sensitivity and intolerance.

I predict Palin will be back to number 2 on the list. She was attacked most of 2011 and stayed too quiet and did very little campaigning. Palin will lead Conservatives back in 2012. She has to, there really is nobody else. I guess nobody admires Mitt Romney, Allahpundit. Your man Mitt Romney couldn’t even crack the Top 10 despite running for 6 years. Rick Perry and Herman Cain, two losers that this site pushed couldn’t crack the Top 10 either.
Palin kept a low profile and was accused of inspiring murder and was attacked in 4 Books and a documentary and is still almost admired as Big Butt Moochele, whom is never attacked by the media. Sarah Palin is alive and well. Allahpundit is alive, but certainly not well. Long live the Arctic Fox. ‘Cuda Forever.

So far it has only been Muslims who actually kill people over jokes and cartoons. Some Christians seem to be heading down the same path of over-sensitivity and intolerance

Yeah because that statement isn’t an overreaction. Outrage and offense are worlds away from cutting heads off. You seem to be worried about Christian overreaction all the while you are over reacting yourself.

Yes, but he’s a useful idiot not an actual premeditating mass murderer. Justifying it and sticking to your principles after many decades of experience makes all the difference. Can’t you see what a wonderful man he is? He’s so enlightened that the petty little details of actual progress are beneath his exalted status. That’s why they call them ‘progressives’ by the way, because they continually talk about it, and push for it, in the face of stubborn reality which one day will conform to their world view. I can only hope that one day I am so evolved as to be able to simultaneously ignore and exploit real injustice for the sake of imaginary principles.

I’m commenting on certain Christians expressing outrage and claiming they’re being attacked and insulted over nothing more than a simple joke. In my view, that’s being over-sensitive. Anyone who takes a simple joke aimed at Tim Tebow and turns it into an outright attack on all of Christianity is being over-sensitive and just playing the victim card. And for the record, as a Broncos fan I really don’t care about Tebow’s religiousness – whatever works for him – as long as he performs on the field in the job he’s getting paid to do. Even he seems to understand that his personality and current fame make him a target for humor and discussion, and he’s ok with it. And even he has said he does not consider the Tebowing fad as an insult – but others have.

A priest, a rabbi, and a minister walk into a bar….
A protestant family moves moves into a catholic heighborhood and grills steaks every Friday…..
What do Michael Jackson and a catholic priest have in common….
There are lots of simple jokes like this that have been around for years. They do not constitute attacks on Christianity. Maher’s unfunny crap and certain NEA funded art displays are a different story.